


Alex Annie Alexis Anne

by neatomosquito



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode: s09e19, Episode: s09e19 Alex Annie Alexis Ann, Family, Female Friendship, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Stockholm Syndrome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-24
Updated: 2014-04-24
Packaged: 2018-01-20 15:22:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1515341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neatomosquito/pseuds/neatomosquito
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"And maybe one day she'll take back all the other names, take them back like conquered kingdoms." Alex-Annie-Alexis-Anne wonders over her name, can she be one of the four she'd been during this whole mess, or does she have to start from the beginning, again?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alex Annie Alexis Anne

_Alex_.

That's what she had said. What she had said when those two men had called her _Annie_. It rolled off the tongue like it belonged there. Because she had been given it with love and with purpose and with understanding.

But she was wrong, wasn't she? All along they had played her and _used_ her; her Mama, her brothers, _used_ her like she was _theirs_ to take.

She thought of _Alex_ now and it made her feel sick. She thought of someone else calling her Alex, where the name would sound new and fresh and _wrong_ in the life she was trying to recreate. So Alex was off the list.

Alexis, perhaps? Maybe she could make it her own, a last _fuck you_ to Mama, if she didn't get the animosity when she stuck her half-full of dead man's blood. Maybe take it and shorten it to Lexie, or Lex, something new and exciting and _all hers_.

But it was still so _wrong_ and the thought of writing down her full name, God, the thought of even writing down that partial bit of her full name was so wrong and disgusting and it made her sick. It made her _ill_. So no to Alexis. No to Lexie.

Next was Annie.

Annie...she hadn't _been_ Annie for _years_. She could hardly remember being called it. Maybe she'd repressed the memories like a good little vampiric lure, but she did recall the name used with love. Or maybe she'd constructed it, in the days lying, waiting for the cure to wear off, that somewhere she might have had a family. Even her grandmother was old and dead and never coming back. Even if she had been looking for her and missing her ever since she lost her granddaughter.

But Annie, it felt so awkward in her mouth. Like the lyrics to a song she didn't know. They had called her Annie. She had snapped at them, and it felt right to deny it. Was it different now? After her whole family kicking the bucket? She tried again, staring at the ceiling as the read slowly eased out of her eyes.

And the senses that had flared after the change shrunk and diluted.

 _Annie. Annie. Annie_. Like a lullaby.

But it didn't fit. It was the name for a young girl and for a different time. A different time. All her names seemed so fake and wrong. _A different time_.

So no. She wouldn't be Annie. She would never be Annie. That little girl with the smiles and the pigtails, with the grandmother and the 'life ahead of her', she was dead. She'd died a long time ago.

Maybe _Anne_ had something to do with that.

 _Anne_.

Anne had been her brothers idea. They had laughed afterwards and she had brushed it off like it didn't stir something in her. Like it didn't make her want to leave, even though she loved them. Even though she knew that you didn't leave family. Because they were all she had. She knew that. They'd told her.

_"You'll be Anne tonight, ok Kid?"_

_She'd nodded and smirked. Smirking was a good go to. You could smirk through tears and you could smirk though laughter. It was control, it was exactly what she needed. What she was forcing herself to become._

_Her brother ruffed up her hair affectionately. "Knock 'em dead."_

_Her smirk was a fixture on her face. "Oh, no. That's your job."_

_They'd laughed and she'd left._

_Anne. Annie. Anne._

_It thrummed through her head. She couldn't shake it out._

Anne. The men with the gross eyes and the wandering hands.

"You're beautiful, you're _hot_ , c'mon baby, _I'll make a woman out of you_."

"How old are you? 16? 17? _That's hot as hell_."

Paedophiles and creeps and everything wrong with the world. She'd managed to make some sort of peace for a while there with that, with the knowledge of what they were. But their screams? Their last gasps of air? Their eyes, dead, lost, wide and staring?

Maybe they didn't deserve to live, but they didn't deserve to die either.

And the pain, all the _pain_ that came with being Anne. The perfect little pretty girl. With the shiny brown eyes and soft hair. With the loose morals and low expectations. With the screams and the pain and the suffering that _she_ caused.

No. She couldn't even _think_ about it. She didn't _want_ to be Anne.

She never, ever, wanted to be Anne again.

So what was she? She thought about taking another name. With her new life and Jodie and the world without so much goddamn _blood_ , there was always becoming a _Lucy_ or a _Stevie_ or an _Eliza_. But where would that take her? She would always be Alex and Annie and Anne and Alexis. Then she'd just be adding another name to the list. Another name that might be tainted, _stolen._

But who was she, if she didn't have a name? She didn't even have a _last_ name. She was _no one_.

She had Jodie. Jodie would smile at her and brush her hair in the mornings when it was really bad, telling her stories about Owen and her dead husband. First it was just old stuff, his first words and when he'd taken his first steps.

And then it got personal. It made her a little uncomfortable, but she listened anyway. Jodie would go quiet, her voice would be just above a rasp, and she'd talk about the apocalypse.

She remembered something about that. Something about Eve and something about the freedom of all monsters into the new world.

Her Mama had been excited and her brothers had gone out in celebration. They'd asked her to join them. She'd smirked and told them that she was fine.

Back when she was Alex.

Back when she was Anne.

And Jodie would take and she would listen and they'd sit by each other.

One time she asked Jodie what she should introduce herself as. She thought Jodie might suggest Annie. She thought she might not know and suggest 'Anne'.

But she didn't. She just hugged her tightly, like she was the most important person in the universe, and spoke, in a soft, unhurried voice, telling her that she could be whoever she wanted to be.

That this was different from the bullshit spiel from Careers Counsellors, and she'd chuckled at her own joke and smiling, looked her in the eye.

She hadn't really got it, but she'd laughed anyway.

* * *

"Hey, Jodie!"

Jodie lead her through the crowds. The police precinct was having its annual 'Let Your Hair Down' Gala to raise funds for the station and Jodie was guest of honour, bringing her along for the ride to try and get her out and about, seeing her losing herself, seeing her looking out the window and wondering about the Could've-been's.

Jodie turned and beamed, mouth spreading into a fully-fledged smile when she saw who it was. "Jonathan! Hey!"

The man had a grin to rival Jodie's and he bent down and hugged her. Jodie pulled back and laughed, looking at him and shaking her head. "I can't believe it! When did you get back?"

As Jodie spoke, _Alex Annie Alexis Anne_ looked through the crowd and tried not to feel bored. Jodie had bought her a nice dress and leant her a pair of shoes. Then again, it wasn't Jodie's party, and well within her rights to state that the party sucked.

"And who's this?" Jonathan turned to the girl who'd once been a vampire, smiling down at her with something she'd once mistake for patronising and now recognised as something as simple as friendliness.

_"It's ok," Jodie had said, after she had taken offence and snipped at an old lady who'd just moved into town. "You didn't know. You do now."_

Who's this?

The question prompted something in her. She'd always been a determined girl. Hell, she'd run away more times than she could remember and she'd kept at it until it stuck. She was fiery and 'practically feral' and raised as a tool to a family of leeches. She was lost and she'd _made herself be found_ and hadn't realised until too long that the power had always been in _her_. The power to find herself.

Those people. Mama. Her brothers. They'd _used_ her.

And Jodie hadn't told her that, she'd worked it out for herself. It had been 8 months. She'd worked out a lot. But more importantly, 8 months was a long time to live with no name.

They'd taken from her and she would take something back.

She wasn't Annie. Not really. Annie had died a lost, little girl.

She'd been born again as Alex, but she hadn't been reborn a third time. She'd changed, everyone changes, but she'd _learnt_ and she'd _become._

"Alex," she said, reaching out her hand, sending a big _Fuck You Mama_ to wherever the hell vampires ended up after decapitation. Her voice caught on the x, but he didn't notice. He just shook her hand and smiled and introduced himself.

"Jonathan," he said. "An old friend of Jodie's."

He smiled like he hadn't just witnessed something earth-shattering, like Alex's world hadn't just stopped and started in the three heartbeats it had taken to say her name.

 _Alex. Alex. Alex._ Around and around in her head. Like a promise.

She looked up and caught Jodie's eye. She'd missed the surprise and the split second of fear on the cop's face, but she didn't miss the pride.

True pride.

_Well done on luring that man to his death, Alex._

_Well done on finding yourself. Well done on being yourself. Well done on choosing._

And it sounds so much better, so much cleaner, and she can feel herself in the claiming, in the staking herself on this name, on this self.

And maybe one day she'll take back all the other names, take them back like conquered kingdoms. Next might be Alexis, Mama's first dead daughter. And then maybe Anne. Maybe she'll find some way to revive Annie. Maybe she'll have four names, four names that she's fought for and four names that she's won.

But Alex'll do for now.


End file.
